Institutional Ethnography as a Method to Understand the Career and Parental Leave Experiences of...

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Institutional Ethnography as a Method to Understand the Career and Parental Leave Experiences of STEM Faculty Members

June 2011118th ASEE Annual Conference & ExpositionVancouver, BC, Canada

Mercado Santiago, M., Pawley, A. L., Hoegh, J., & Banerjee, D.Purdue University


Plan1. Introduction2. Institutional Ethnography Research

Methodology3. Giddens’ Theory of Structuration4. Methods5. Demographics 6. Preliminary Themes7. Preliminary Recommendations


Introduction *

Women and ethnic minorities remain underrepresented in STEM faculty positions both compared to the population of faculty members within United States and to the general US population.

There is a need to understand how policies structure institutions that result in women and people of color’s underrepresentation in academia.

*. Gibbons, M.T. (2010). Engineering by the numbers. Retrieved from http://wwwtemp.asee.org/publications/profiles/upload/2009ProfileEngOverview.pdf

*. National Science Foundation. (2009). Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and

Engineering. Arlington, VA: National Science Foundation.


IntroductionGoal of the study:

◦Identify the disconnects between peoples’ experiences of the parental leave policy and the structures of the policy.

Why our goal is important?◦To improve our policy and procedures◦Demonstrate how this research method

can help university administrators improve the labor context of STEM faculty members.


IntroductionResearch Question

How does the parental leave policy and procedures shape STEM faculty members’ experiences in ways that affect their personal and career life?


Institutional Ethnography Research Methodology*

Starts from the experiences of people in the institution’s processes

Lived experiences of employees help researchers identify:how social relations structure the

bigger institutional system how policy structures affect

employees’ career and life experiences

*. Smith, D. E. (2005). Institutional ethnography: A sociology for people. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press. *. Campbell, M, & Gregor, F. (2004). Mapping social relations: A primer in doing institutional ethnography. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.

Parental Leave Policy and procedures (and other policies and procedures)

Eligible faculty member Department head

Business office administrative(s)

Central administrationpersonnel

(Others: senior faculty members, mentors,

staff members, childcare administrators, etc)

Childcarefacilities

Teaching load

Internal/External

deadlines

Service (e.g., committees)

Sick leave policy

Research lab

AdviseesWork-family

policies of external

grants


Structuration Theory*

Social systems exist only because of the repeated enactment of structures (rules and procedures) through social practices.e

Social structures are also dual: they not just shape people’s experiences, but also people’s actions reconstruct or shape structures.e

*. Sewell, W. H. (1992). A theory of structure: Duality, agency, and transformation. The American Journal of Sociology, 98(1), 1-29.


Structuration Theory• In this study, the parental leave

policy is our main social system, situated along with the other structures that work together with it (such as FMLA, sick leave, unpaid leave, etc.).

ParentalLeavePolicy

(and other policies)

( social system )

( rules and procedures ) < structuration >

< structuration >< structures >

Actors

Actors

Actors

< structuration >


MethodsSemi-structured interviews

conducted between 2009 and 2010.Recruitment mostly through

snowball sampling and grassrootsBroad themes were identified first

and then we compiled those that were equivalent (using NViVo).

Still collecting data. 25 cases so far.


DemographicsNum. Area Position Category Gender

A1 Engineering Assistant professor Administrator Female

A2 Non-STEM Full professor Administrator Female

A3 Non-STEM Staff User Female

A4 University-Wide Staff Administrator Male

A5 University-Wide Staff*2 Admins. in one interview

Both Female

A6 Engineering Assistant professor User Female

A7 Engineering Assistant professor Eligible Male

A8 Science Full professor Administrator Male

A9 Science Assistant professor User Female

A10 Non-STEM Associate professor User Female

A11 Science Associate professor User Male

A12 Non-STEM Assistant professor User FemaleEng = 3; Non-STEM = 4; Science = 3; University-Wide admins = 3 (A5 had 2 admins)


ThemesChildcare

Access to information about parental leave

Faculty members continue their work even on leave

Additional themesThe need to improve adoption benefitsThe way that the policy is writtenAdjusting pregnancy timing to better manage teaching load


ChildcareA9 / Science / Assistant Professor / Female / UserInterviewer: So tell me a little about your-- how you arranged for childcare [?]

Participant: Oh yeah. So I signed up-- here’s something that is a big problem at Institute 1. On campus childcare is-- I think I made an analogy that it’s like unicorns and rainbows. [Laughs] It’s like it doesn’t-- it supposedly exists, but there are something like 24 spots total for how many people on this campus?


ChildcareA7 /Engineering/ Assistant Professor /Male/EligibleInterviewer: Have you utilized any of Institute 1's-- or have you found any of Institute 1's services to help find childcare?

Participant: We are certainly aware of all the different Institute 1 options for childcare. Most of the ones we’ve looked at, because we just need part time care, are prohibitively expensive. So we’re sort of exploring alternatives. Because we really only need care maybe a few half days a week.


ThemesChildcare


Faculty member continue their work even on leave




A9 / Science / Assistant Professor / Female / UserParticipant: My experience with the Dept ADMIN website in general is that it’s not very useful. [Laughs] But it tends to send you around in circles and not give you the information you need and just, you end up having to call somebody over there or go over there anyway.



A6 / Engineering / Assistant Professor / Female / UserInterviewer: A quick question. You had referred to the handbook. Is that a written document that you have, like a book or is it an online [?]...

Participant: So I have mine. The written one sometimes I’ll find that I’m doing web searches and I’ll think I find things that are either excerpts from this or at least very, very similar online, too. But I generally find the Institute 1 website a little bit difficult to navigate in finding information. So if I’m trying to find information from the Institute 1 website, I will do a [Web search]. I will go to [Web portal]; I will type in Institute 1, and then whatever I’m looking for. And sometimes I find it and sometimes I don’t. [Laughs] so then I’ll look at things like this handbook or just talk to people.


ThemesChildcare


Faculty members continue their work even on leave



Faculty members continue their work on leave

A6 / Engineering / Assistant Professor / Female / UserParticipant: When you think about the different pieces, there’s the research, the teaching and there’s the service. And so, again, with the kind of service category, I wasn’t attending the faculty meetings until about [month]. Wasn’t attending committee meetings, gave occasional input to people about that, though. And then the other piece of service is kind of external to the Institute 1 community. So reviewing conference papers, reviewing journal papers. I was doing that stuff. I had people contact me and say, “Can you review this paper please?” I said, “oh. OK.” And so the only other way it would be different from a normal semester where I wasn’t teaching was just that I was at home more. Doing the work at home.



A7 / Engineering / Assistant Professor / Male / EligibleParticipant: I was concerned about finding people to fill in. I mean, I had made the decision at the beginning of the semester I could have requested from the department to not have a teaching commitment this semester. I made the decision in discussion with my wife that I would teach this semester. One of the reasons was because I was somewhat drawn to the teaching assignment. It’s also a sequence course.



A7 / Engineering / Assistant Professor / Male / EligibleInterviewer: So how did you manage your other work outside of teaching during that time?

Participant: What I tried to do really was for the various research projects I was working on, I really tried to get them all sort of-- a good way to describe it… I tried to get the house in order as we were getting closer and closer to the baby. To the due date. So for instance, making sure that all my research assistants had a list of tasks to work on while I was gone or while I wasn’t in as communication as much. [….] I had colleagues who were waiting on things from me…I tried to get all that in order. So I didn’t have it hanging over my head after our [child] was born.


ThemesChildcare





The Need to Improve Adoption Benefits

A5 / University-Wide / Two administrators in one interview / Both femaleParticipant 1: I think the one thing that we do hear from time to time in relationship to this is that we do not have paid adoption benefits. We don’t have any. So that does come up from time to time. Not necessarily in relationship to this paid parental, but in the area of parental leave and needs for family.

Interviewer: What would be-- I guess what are adoption benefits?

Participant 1: You can offer benefits for the [fees] that somebody would pay. There’s travel and fees and that kind of thing. And there are programs and there are, you know, a lot of employers that offer some tax benefits for some level of adoption benefits that you would provide.


The Way that the Policy is WrittenA1 / Engineering / Assistant Professor / Female / AdministratorParticipant: Institute 2 [institution of comparison] one is very,

like, written for [eighth] graders and its, like if you are this person in this circumstance this is what you do to, this is the policy, this is what is expected. And ours is written for people from another planet (Interviewer: laughs), for people from another planet.


Adjusting Pregnancy to Manage Teaching Load

A8 / Science / Full Professor / Male / AdministratorParticipant: So for example, the STEM department is dominantly, as a research department, I mean, a very large component of what we do is research, and therefore, our teaching loads is not as heavy as say they may be in liberal arts, and so, but even in Dept STEM, women were adjusting their pregnancies to try and give birth over the summer when we don't teach in the summer. We just teach in the spring and the fall and then summer our salaries are covered by our research funds and so forth.


SummaryChildcare



Additional themes

Policy as written doesn’t meet faculty members’ needs for leave or childcare

Faculty make accommodations to go around policy;The policy remains inadequate


Update post ASEE paper• Focus on interviewing department

heads.• Race and ethnicity demographics

information.• Working paper that analyses the

experiences of ten faculty members who took the leave (or who were eligible). – We will submit it this year to JWMSE


Policy-Related Recommendations• Research about the labor context of

STEM faculty members should inform policy-related decisions.

• Explore other universities’ policies on modified duties.

• Faculty members should seek permission from their department heads to enact their leave intermittently.


Other Recommendations• Mechanism in the policy should be

included to ensure that faculty members can find childcare services on campus before returning to work. – There is an urgent need of childcare

services for infants less than one year old.


AcknowledgementsThis research is based upon work supported by the National Science Foundation under Grant No. HRD 0811194. Any opinions, findings and conclusions or recommendations expressed in this material are those of the authors and do not necessarily reflect the views of the National Science Foundation.


Thanks for your attention

Questions?

ADVANCE Research TeamPurdue Center for Faculty Success

Hall for Discovery and Learning Research207 S. Martin Jischke Drive, Suite 228

West Lafayette, IN 47907 (765) 494-9335

Presentation prepared and given by the Research Assistant Marisol Mercado Santiago ([email protected])

mailto:[email protected]


Referencesa. Gibbons, M.T. (2010). Engineering by the numbers. Retrieved from

http://wwwtemp.asee.org/publications/profiles/upload/2009ProfileEngOverview.pdf

b. National Science Foundation, Division of Science Resources Statistics. (2009). Women, Minorities, and Persons with Disabilities in Science and Engineering. Arlington, VA: National Science Foundation.

c. Smith, D. E. (2005). Institutional ethnography: A sociology for people. Lanham, MD: AltaMira Press.

d. Campbell, M, & Gregor, F. (2004). Mapping social relations: A primer in doing institutional ethnography. Walnut Creek, CA: AltaMira Press.

e. Sewell, W. H. (1992). A theory of structure: Duality, agency, and transformation. The American Journal of Sociology, 98(1), 1-29.

f. Giddens, A. (1986). The constitution of society: Outline of the theory of structuration. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press.

g. Sullivan, B., Hollenshead, C., & Smith, G. (2004). Developing and implementing work-family policies for faculty [Electronic version]. Academe, 90(6). Retrieved from http://www.aaup.org/AAUP/pubsres/academe/2004/ND/Feat/04ndsulli.htm

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